


(I Can't Get Used To) Living Without You

by Stratisphyre



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: (but not the one you're thinking of), Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Crack, a lighter and softer heaven, a lighter and softer hell, non-binary Beelzebub
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-17
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-12-21 10:43:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21073595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stratisphyre/pseuds/Stratisphyre
Summary: In which Crowley, the Prince of Hell, and the Archangel Aziraphale, leader of the Heavenly Host, meet to discuss the failed Apocalypse and their agents down on Earth.





	(I Can't Get Used To) Living Without You

The Archangel Aziraphale gazed across the duckpond of St. James’, to where Gabriel and Beelzebub, his demonic counterpart, were completely failing to be innocuous, spreading smugly across a bench. He’d come down to check on his agent, make sure the angel was quite well after their adventure at the Tadfield airbase. He hadn’t expected to see him sitting quite so closely to Beelzebub, but couldn’t say he was surprised. The two of them were thick as thieves by all reports. Reports that had come, perhaps, a bit too late to do anything to rectify the contents. Not that he’d made it a particular priority once Sandalphon had shoved them in his face. He’d had other concerns, after all. He did feel terrible about him, Michael, and Uriel attempting to take matters into their own hands, and had given them a proper talking-to once he’d found out. He couldn’t have his angels going rogue. Or, at least, he couldn’t have _more_ of his angels going rogue.

My, but Gabriel did appear happy.

“Well that went over like a lead balloon.”

He didn’t quite jump, but he may have started a bit as the Prince of Hell slipped down onto the bench beside him. His ever-present snake—hanging across his shoulders like an indolent scarf instead of curled around his neck as per usual—tilted its head up to glance Aziraphale’s way before lying back flat against Crowley’s chest. Its black scales and red belly complemented Crowley’s all-black ensemble and highlighted his brilliant gold eyes.

Aziraphale wore his pristine white suit as armour.

“I’d like to dunk them in Holy water,” Crowley muttered, glaring at Beelzebub.

“You won’t be getting any from us, I assure you,” Aziraphale responded.

Crowley scoffed. “What, we’re going to let them get away with this… _fraternizing_?! Six thousand years we planned for this, and now it’s all going to waste because of two underlings who didn’t have the decency to do what they’re told?!”

“I wasn’t aware your side trucked much with decency.”

“You know bloody well what I mean!”

Aziraphale allowed himself a small smile, and Crowley glared at him.

“As though you don’t want to immolate him. I could make it happen,” Crowley finally muttered.

“I would never! He was acting in his own conscience. And perhaps he had a point about ineffability. We don’t know that She didn’t plan for this very outcome from the beginning.”

“Well, himself is being a right tit about things Downstairs. If this was Her plan, he’s not happy about it.”

Was that why Crowley was here, then? Aziraphale couldn’t imagine how awkward it must’ve been in Hell, if Satan himself was in a strop. Bad enough he was dealing with his own angels, who had a rather deep-set irritation at having been all dressed up with no place to go. Michael had been particularly snippy with him when Aziraphale said he was going to visit Earth to look in on Gabriel. From the looks of things, had she had it her way, Crowley’s offer of hellfire would be immediately accepted.

It was a small miracle, literally, that Gabriel and Beelzebub hadn’t noticed them yet. Beelzebub sat sideways on the bench, their legs hiked up over the arm and resting their back against Gabriel’s side. Aziraphale’s principality was saying something, effusively gesticulating with his hands. And while Gabriel mightn’t have been able to see the fond smile on Beelzebub’s face, Aziraphale had a grand view of it. Rather sweet, really, that they’d spent the past eleven years deliberately contravening their orders to avoid having to face each other across the battlefield. He could empathize quite easily.

Speaking of which. He shifted his attention back to Crowley, who was glowering at them. The look was, perhaps, more _pro forma_ than he intended; try as he might, Aziraphale could find no true malice in it.

“Quite a few things on Earth it’d be a shame to let go to waste,” Aziraphale ventured.

Crowley’s lips pinched, but he did eventually nod and cautiously agree, “Yes.”

“Your car, for example.”

Crowley swung his head around to glare. “How in the Heaven do you know about my car?”

“I’m not incompetent, Crowley. Whenever the Prince of Hell deigns come to Earth, regardless of the reason, I keep abreast of it.” Aziraphale tried not to look too smug about it, and likely failed.

“Well,” Crowley blustered. “I know all about your illicit book collection.” It was hardly illicit. Merely expansive. Not that anyone in Heaven really appreciated the exquisite joy of opening a new book and hearing the gentle crack of an untouched binding. They all politely ignored the ever-growing piles slowly accumulating in his office. “How many times have you snuck down to add to it?”

“It’s all for academic purposes,” Aziraphale objected.

“Oh, I’m sure, angel.”

Beelzebub swung around in their seat, and responded to whatever Gabriel had just said by hitting him hard enough to crack his humerus. Gabriel simply favoured them with a fatuous grin and trundled onwards. Beelzebub really did appear as though they wanted to do nothing more than deliver another blow, but they settled down in their seat instead, pressing their back up against Gabriel’s side once more, even as they crossed their arms over their chest and huffed out an irritated sigh.

“How did we miss it?” Crowley asked, gesturing across the duck pond at them.

Aziraphale had to admit it was abundantly obvious. “We weren’t looking for it. His reports, at least, were quite convincing.”

“What, you read them all?”

“It’s my job, dear. I am the leader of the Heavenly Host, after all. It would be terribly disrespectful of me to demean the accomplishments of my subordinates by _not_ reading them.”

“You read every single one of the reports he filed over six thousand years and never once wondered if he mightn’t have gone native?”

“Of course I wondered. I first began to worry when he wrote me a sixty-page dissertation extolling the virtues of vicuna over cashmere and failed to reply to my questions about his mission to thwart Beelzebub’s plans for Henry and Anne. And after that he was ever so excited about opening his own haberdashery, I couldn’t diminish that by claiming he’d gotten too close to his custom.”

Crowley rolled his eyes, presumably searching the sky for patience. Aziraphale might have told him there was none up there to be found.

Eventually, Beelzebub and Gabriel rose from their bench. They gazed at each other with what Aziraphale could only describe as affection; a feigned lack of enthusiasm on the part of the demon, but easy and soft as it emanated from Gabriel. And obvious either way. Gabriel opened his arms and Beelzebub sneered at him, turning their body away to give a literal shoulder. However, as Aziraphale watched, they both leaned forward until that same shoulder was pressed to Gabriel’s sternum. Gabriel wrapped his arms around them and buried his face in their hair.

“Awful,” Crowley hissed without ire.

“Completely,” Aziraphale said, not a trace of real agreement in his voice.

He found himself smiling expansively. It gave him rather quite a lot of hope that the War could be permanently averted, instead of merely temporarily ceased, as his Host was currently touting. He’d never really wanted the War. And certainly hadn’t _really_ wanted to do direct battle with Crowley, either. He much preferred their method of battling which involved rather more bickering than he was used to. It was—dare he admit it?—enjoyable. In its own way.

They both watched keenly as Gabriel and Beelzebub left the park. They weren’t doing anything as obvious as holding hands, but they did keep close to one another. Occasionally Beelzebub swayed Gabriel’s way, softly brushing their shoulders together before jumping back and spitting something presumably demeaning at him. Gabriel, nonplussed and gruntled, continued with his even gait until they’d disappeared out the gates.

“I guess this is it, then,” Crowley said. “Been simply awful submitting myself to your presence, Aziraphale. Couldn’t think of a worse being to have planned out the failed Apocalypse with.”

Tickled by the compliment, Aziraphale nodded. “Indeed. It’s been completely unbearable. I wish nothing but the absolute worse for you from this point on.”

Crowley inclined his chin, but looked to be in no hurry to rise from the bench. Aziraphale remained as well, though he couldn’t imagine what was keeping him. He had duties to attend to; a whole Host completely out of sorts, more than one of them baying for blood. It was all dreadfully unangelic. He’d been forced to book everyone into a mandatory seminar in which he was going to have to make it absolutely clear that there would be no unauthorized smitings of any kind; especially against a certain scapegoat and his demon.

_His demon._ Hmm.

“Are you going to miss it?” Aziraphale suddenly asked. Crowley glanced at him askance and Aziraphale splayed his hands. “The… planning. We’ve spent nearly six thousand years conceiving of battles and strategy and how we’re going to end each other’s lives. I’ll certainly have great swaths open time in my schedule without it.”

He and Crowley hadn’t met _regularly_, but certainly often enough to be more than simply familiar with one another. When they’d all gathered at the airbase, Aziraphale had been surprisingly hesitant to draw his flaming sword and commence hostilities. There was no small sense of relief it hadn’t come to it. Not that he _liked_ Crowley of course. One couldn’t simply _like_ the Prince of Hell. But he couldn't _dislike_ him, which posed a rather trickier number of problems.

Crowley’s lips pinched together. “Suppose I might do. Had all these plans of killing you, didn’t I?”

“The feeling is quite mutual. I imagined smiting you, jolly, a number of times, in various ways.”

“What was your favourite?”

“Oh, using a spear, most definitely. I’d rather fancied the idea of recreating Raphael’s _St. Michael Vanquishing Satan._ Maybe inspire a few woodcuts of my own.”

“Not bad, angel,” Crowley said. “I liked the idea of drowning you in venom, myself.”

They settled back into comfortable silence.

“Humans,” Aziraphale said, then hesitated. He was being ludicrous.

Crowley blinked slowly. “Yes? What of them?”

“You must have noticed changes in how wars have been fought in the past few centuries. Humans might consider the plans we made terribly anachronistic, now.” Crowley waited him out, and Aziraphale’s thoughts quickly tumbled from his mouth. “And without that awful hand-to-hand business, they’ve come up with some brilliant ways to, er, scratch the itch, as it were. Turning wars into turn-based strategy games. It’s all quite thrilling, I understand. Perhaps we could do battle? Across such a field, I mean, instead of with venom and spears and all that drivel.”

“Angel,” Crowley drawled, “Are you seriously asking me to play Risk with you?”

“Could be a spot of fun,” Aziraphale replied. “Perhaps with some wine and tapas?”

“‘Wine and tapas?’” Crowley repeated with a bark of laughter. “Am I to understand the Archangel Aziraphale has been sneaking down to Earth for a nip?”

“You can tell quite a bit about civilization based on their wine,” Aziraphale informed him primly. “I was merely verifying that they’ve all been blossoming the way they’re supposed to.” Crowley still hadn’t answered his question and Aziraphale coughed; terrible nervous habit that confused the rest of the Host to no end. “Never mind. I know you must be terribly busy, impelling the agents of Hell to do your evil bidding—”

Crowley slithered to his feet in such a way that he’d obviously forgotten the limitations one experienced when in possession of a spine. “All right.” It may have been Aziraphale’s imagination, but Crowley’s snake appeared to thud its tail happily against Crowley’s chest.

“Really?” Aziraphale grinned ear-to-ear. He stood and fell into step with Crowley. Before they reached the park gates, Crowley whipped out a pair of sunglasses and slipped them down over his eyes.

“I’m playing black though.”

“Well I’m obviously playing white.” Crowley’s Bentley was parked not too far from the exit, and he shuffled ahead to open the passenger-side door.

“Not sure there’s white pieces in a standard Risk set, angel.”

“I can promise you, my dear, there will be.”

**Author's Note:**

> (I maintain that Beelzebub is more aggressive in this than in canon because Gabriel could drive a nun to violence). 
> 
> All comments and kudos gratefully accepted and cherished!


End file.
